{"id":423,"date":"2017-03-18T22:28:24","date_gmt":"2017-03-18T22:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/?p=423"},"modified":"2024-03-18T15:36:00","modified_gmt":"2024-03-18T15:36:00","slug":"speed-sketching","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/speed-sketching\/","title":{"rendered":"Speed sketching"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recently for a few years I stopped carrying a sketchbook even after having done that all my life, at least since I was a schoolboy. But I’m back sketching now – and enjoying it.<\/p>\n

\"sketches
I was warming up at sketching and added notes to myself as I noticed my faults and sticking points. Lighten up on the pens strokes, people facing to the left are more difficult for me to draw. And I was gripping the sketch book like a drowning man.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

People.<\/h3>\n

People is what I like to draw. I enjoy that more than drawing scenery or buildings.<\/p>\n

Usually I draw in a cafe and focus on fellow customers seated at tables. But lately I’ve been sketching at tables in the open inside shopping mall courts.<\/p>\n

\"sketches
These sketches allowed slightly more time for me to draw as the people were at self service tills. I still only had seconds but at least they were not traveling past at speed.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

<\/p>\n

The pages below are from last week. My viewpoint allowed me to observe pedestrians coming from three different directions and they didn’t stop as they passed so I had to work fast.<\/p>\n

\"Sketching
With these sketches I only had seconds (3-4) because the people were all walking past without stopping. I had to draw extremely fast. Sometimes the pen didn’t leave the paper once.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Getting Cramps.<\/h3>\n

Because I was out of practise in my sketching I was discovering kink after kink in my draftsmanship, it was like being wobbly on a bike after not using one for a few years.\u00a0 I made some notes to myself amongst the sketches to drive home the things I needed to change.<\/p>\n

Mainly to lighten up. I was getting tense and gripping the pad too fiercely even to the stage of giving myself cramp in the hand.<\/p>\n

I also found I could lighten up gripping the pen and the weight of strokes too.<\/p>\n

Not that I was scoring grooves into the paper but allowing myself to shift to using an extremely light touch increased the variety and sensitivity of marks available immediately.<\/p>\n

Trust the Hand.<\/h3>\n

And I worked on letting myself trust my hand to make good marks.<\/p>\n

Over-thinking and being too controlling of the pen cramps the flow of the drawing. Let go, let go.<\/p>\n

I made myself concentrate much more on acutely observing the subject and much less watching and controlling the act of drawing. Let it go. Let it go. Chill man.<\/p>\n

\"more
This sketch allowed me to take my time as I was in a cafe with customers seated at tables. The sketching was still executed quickly because no-one held a pose. But surprisingly – people will often assume the same pose over again if you’re patient.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"drawing
These sketches were done in a pub – Royal Bar, Edinburgh. This usually means I have to force myself to be rude. I don’t drink alone in pubs and if I want to make some sketches I have to excuse myself from participating in the usually beery conversation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Save<\/span><\/p>\n

Save<\/span><\/p>\n

Save<\/span><\/p>\n

Save<\/span><\/p>\n

Save<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently for a few years I stopped carrying a sketchbook even after having done that all my life, at least since I was a schoolboy. But I’m back sketching now – and enjoying it. People. People is what I like to draw. I enjoy that more than drawing scenery or buildings. Usually I draw in … Continue reading Speed sketching<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[12,14,13,15,16],"class_list":["post-423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drawing","tag-biro","tag-cafe","tag-people","tag-sketch","tag-sketchbook"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=423"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1130,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423\/revisions\/1130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stooryduster.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}